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Emmaniel Adebayor and Nabil Bentaleb may not be available when Tottenham Hotspur take on Manchester City on Saturday. Such is the nature of internationals.
Both players played for their countries this week and will not be back at the Tottenham training ground until tomorrow so, as of now, no one at the club really knows how they are feeling. They could have strained something, they could be exhausted or they could be perfectly fine.
Mauricio Pochettino said that they have to wait until the players get back before he knows if they can play.
Mauricio: "Adebayor and Bentaleb arrive tomorrow so we have to check them as well." #COYS
— Tottenham Hotspur (@SpursOfficial) October 16, 2014
To be fair, City are also dealing with their own international issues. Yaya Toure looks unlikely to play because he is returning from international duty and the Citizens have a huge Champions League match next week.
Bentaleb probably wasn't going to start on Saturday regardless of international duty and may not have played so his absence wouldn't be a huge deal, but Adebayor's would be. He has struggled in front of goal, but he has done some other things well this season and neither Roberto Soldado nor Harry Kane has shown to be significantly better than the Togolese striker.
Hopefully Adebayor can either play. If not, Soldado or Kane may need to finally have their breakout matches.